


He Who Loves Truly Kills

by Amazing_E_ko



Category: Owl Service - Alan Garner
Genre: Also a past fic, Blood, Car Accidents, Epistolary, Future Fic, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-22
Updated: 2013-12-22
Packaged: 2018-01-05 11:13:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,692
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1093226
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Amazing_E_ko/pseuds/Amazing_E_ko
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The cycle of the valley is old and never-ending. Gwyn and Alison deal with the next generation.</p>
            </blockquote>





	He Who Loves Truly Kills

**Author's Note:**

  * For [a_la_grecque](https://archiveofourown.org/users/a_la_grecque/gifts).



 

Dear Jen,

arrived at the old house on the bus today. Well, I say the bus. It dropped us off twenty miles from the village and we went the rest of the way in Mr Updon’s car. It’s a battered old Volvo and he drives like crazy on the narrow roads – even if we hadn’t been pretty intimidated by him, the twists and turns were enough to shut our mouths. Cecil was positively green when we stumbled out.

The valley is properly lovely. It has these high slate hills that slope down around a central river – though it’s really only a stream up here by the house. The fields, where they aren’t full of sheep, are full of flowers. Meadowsweet and broom and gorse up on the hills. It’s heavenly. The house itself is old, and right in the middle of the valley. It’s more than big enough for all of us – there are rooms that they never use, according to Mrs Updon.

I suppose I should give you some description of our hosts. Mr Updon is a big, solid man, about forty-five, though with a weirdly ageless face that makes me think he could be ten years in either direction. He has really bright blue eyes, and a way of watching you from the corners of them that makes you feel all pinned down. As if he could see right through you. His voice is low and smooth, and in spite of all his years working in the University it still has a hint of Welsh, especially around the vowels. I’m a bit nervous around him, but I also feel like you could trust him with anything, and he’d help you out.

Mrs Updon is totally different. She small and slight, and her hair, which is mostly blonde but going grey at the roots, is cut very short. She’s a very sensible-looking person – tramps around in wellies and a mac most of the time. When she greeted us she spoke in Welsh, and I just assumed she was a native, but she’s actually English. And from old money, by the sound of her accent. I probably should have figured it out earlier. I mean she writes under her maiden name, and it’s not exactly pure Welsh, is it? But it never occurred to me. Her stories are full of Welsh mythology, and she always writes as though she experienced what was happening. I can’t wait to ask her about some of her books – _The Hare and the Hound_ especially. I just have to know if Daffy survived.

The Updons’ son is also here, a tall boy called Huw, about my age. He looks a lot like his dad, but he has his mum’s smile. He’s quite handsome. (I’m trying not to let Cecil notice that I think this, because the whole situation is pretty awkward.)

They’re exceptional hosts, all three of them. When we arrived there was a whole spread laid on for us, with scones and sandwiches and cake and tea. We were fit to burst by the time we stood up again. Then Huw took myself and Cecil up over the mountain, to walk off the food. He spent the whole time telling us stories of the local area. There’s more mythology here than I thought possible – to hear the locals tell it, every famous tale in Wales happened within five miles of the valley. I didn’t say that, though. Didn’t want to offend anyone on my first night.

*

Sorry for the break – I was in the middle of writing when Mrs Updon came in and told us that dinner was ready, and then we spent the rest of the evening playing cards and chatting. I didn’t get up to my room until midnight.

Today was a bit exhausting, to tell the truth. Cecil and Mr Updon squirrelled themselves away in Mr Updon’s study after breakfast, to get to work on Cecil’s Welsh, I suppose. Mrs Updon was in her room, working away, and Huw was doing the gardening, so I let them be and headed off into the valley. I was just doing preliminary research, you know, figuring out who the different farmers are and all that. It was good, though, and I can already tell that this is a great place to do my research. They keep up a lot of the old traditions here – there’s so much we can learn about sustainable farming. The bloody EEC might want us all dancing to the one tune, but these farmers have been working this land for generations, and they don’t need a bunch of clowns in Brussels telling them what to do.

Oh no, look at me wasting all my paper on ranting! I guess it’s from a lack of news really. The long and the short of this letter is: Cecil and I are well, the place is lovely, and I’ll write again soon when I’ve more news.

Yours,

Annys.

_1648_

_They knew she was coming by the thickets of broom and meadowsweet. The growth so heavy, needing to be cut back for the sheep, was a sign and a half, and many of the villagers made the sign of the cross over their doors. “Let it not be us,” they said, “let us not be chosen.” A long wait meant a hard coming, and it had been near thirty years since the last one. Young Adwr would be called, of course, being of that family that it was bound to, but the others might be any of them. They kept a special watch for her, the most dangerous of the three. There were enough young girls in the valley, but none of them had the look, and Adwr’s eyes roamed after none at all._

 

Dear Roger,

Well, the latest group of summer students has arrived – just over a week ago, actually, and of course Gwyn and I have been run off our feet settling them in. I wrote a group, and I’m too lazy to start this letter again, but actually it was only two this year, and English boy and a Welsh girl. Nice enough, both of them, though of course they’re very modern and up to date. They make me feel my age.

I hope Kelly is well – in your last letter I got the impression she was rather drained with all her work. You’d think the NHS would take better care of its own. Give her my love, and tell her I can’t wait to see her in August.

I heard from Clive, by the way. He called on Monday, and we had quite a nice chat. I think retirement suits him. By the sound of it, he spends all his time fishing, and honestly seems quite contented. If I’m half as relaxed at his age I’ll feel like I’m doing well.

Gwyn sends his regards (he means love, but you know he’s never been good at saying it), and says to tell you that the fishing is great this year. He also mentioned something about bird watching, though I have to admit I zoned out a little. He does go on rather. But take it from me that we can’t wait to see you. The students will be gone by then, so we’ll have the valley to ourselves. It’ll be just like old times.

Love,

Alison.

PS. Almost didn’t include this, because it’s so silly. You do remember the first summer we spent together, when there was all the trouble with herself? Well, signs are she might be coming back. I wasn’t sure, and I didn’t want to say anything, because it’s been so long. I thought maybe we were done. The tension is in the air, though, and all the shadows seem longer. Gwyn says not to worry, that if it happens it happens, and we’ll deal with it when it does. And I know he’s right, but I can’t help fretting for Huw. He’ll be pulled into it, if she does come. He’s of an age.

PPS. Gwyn was reading this over my shoulder, and he quite rightly pointed out that the PS is not a summons. I know how busy you are, and even if this is what we fear, Gwyn and I can handle it quite well ourselves.

X

Ali

_1873_

_Callwen had always known it would fall to her. A girl from the first family was unusual, but she had the power in her bones, and when the flowers of the oak came into bloom she knew the time was coming. There wasn’t much you could do besides sit and bear it, and hope that the power would be slow in coming and quick in going. She kept an eye on the boys meanwhile, watching them to see if she could see the other ends of the rope, to see if she could guess where it would hang them._

 

Dear Jen,

what a week! I’m sorry I haven’t written until now – I haven’t had a moment to sit down and collect my thoughts until today. But it’s Sunday at last, and even if I wanted to do work I couldn’t, so I’m tucked into the bench in the kitchen garden with a box of biscuits and my paper, and I have all afternoon to tell you everything.

First things first, Cecil says to say hello. He’s well himself. The air here really seems to agree with him, and he’s been quite lively. Sometimes he can be a bit overanxious – he gets worried whenever I go off on my own, which is very annoying – but I know him, and I try not to mind it. I’m just hoping Mr Updon will rub off on him a little. He can be so jittery, and Mr Updon is very solid and sensible. You really get the feeling that if the sky fell he wouldn’t even blink, he’d just take it in stride and get on with his work.

Huw is a bit like that too. He’s been helping me out here and there, since he knows all the locals and he can get them to talk to me. He’s a year younger than us, but he’s really nice, and very clever. He’s waiting on his A level results, and Mrs Updon has been making him work really hard to keep his mind off it. (At least, that’s what he says.)

On Wednesday he took me up to the river, showing me the fishing pools. I was trying to explain my research – the idea of sustainable farming and interconnected ecologies – and he was very good. He listened so patiently, and didn’t interrupt me once. He showed me an old stone, too, a big old slab of a thing with a hole in the middle. It’s quite beautiful, really, and it frames this copse of trees up on the hill most wonderfully, but it made me feel odd. All hot and prickly, as if I were coming down with a fever.

According to Huw the legend is associated with the old myth about Blodeuwedd. I admitted that I didn’t really remember much about it, and he said he’d get his dad to tell it to me later. Apparently Mr Updon tells the story better than anyone. (Note from the future: this is true.) He smiled at me when he said it, all proud of his dad. It was so sweet, and the sunlight lit up his hair with all these hints of red and blond I hadn’t seen before. Not that you’re to go making stories of this, it was just a lovely moment.

Oh I wish I could tell you how beautiful it is here. The whole valley is full of lush growth, and the scent of the flowers is so heavy and sweet you want to drown in it. On Thursday I was down by the river, taking notes, and there was a moment when the entire world seemed to spin on me. I can’t explain it. It was as though I was, for a moment, the focus of everything. Everything that lived and grew in the valley was a part of me, and I was a part of them. I could feel the slow, sleepy movements of the fish, and the scurrying of mice in the hedgerows. I could even feel the plants growing, millimetre by inching millimetre. Then there was a pressure, as if the air was moved by the beating of enormous wings, and the feeling disappeared.

God, when I write it all down even I think I sound barmy! But it did happen, and even if you don’t understand, I want you to remember.

I spent a lot of yesterday with Mrs Updon. She asked me to help her bring in the last of the canes, and so we spent the whole afternoon picking blackcurrants and redcurrants and raspberries. Our hands were stained red by the end, and we had three big baskets full. Mrs Updon’s really lovely – not motherly at all, but very straight-forward and sensible, like the big sister you wish you’d had at school. She doesn’t seem to have any old-fashioned scruples, either. She didn’t make a single comment about my needing a husband – just asked about my research and told me stories of her trips with Mr Updon. She also asked me to call her Ali, but I keep forgetting.

We had dinner outside last night, sitting at a long table that the boys brought out, watching the moths dance over the candlesticks. We ended up talking about stories, and mythology, and how where those tales come from. It was all a bit over my head, but what I did get, I liked a lot.

Towards the end of dinner, when we were finishing off our dessert and the moon was setting below the western mountains, Huw brought up his comment to me, and Mr Updon told us the legend of Blodeuwedd. I hadn’t heard that story for ages, and I’d forgotten how sad it is. It must have been so miserable for her, coming to life without choice, to marry a man she didn’t love. Mrs Updon – Ali – got all still and quiet when he was telling it, like she understood exactly how hard it was for Blodeuwedd. Cecil was listening in raptures, of course, and I think it must have freaked him out more than he wanted to let on, because right at the end of the story he shivered and jumped. When Ali asked him what was wrong he told her he’d felt a wing brush the back of his neck. Ali said it must have been a bat, but Cecil insisted he’d felt wings.

I miss you, my dear, and I hope France is treating you well, but I’m having a grand time here, and not regretting my choice for a minute.

XXX

Annys.

_1648_

_Begw was the girl they all forgot. She lived in a small hut up on the mountain, almost over the border, and she looked after a small flock of sheep. The only time they ever saw her was market day, when she came down to sell her woollen blankets and clothes, and buy the food she needed. She was sullen and silent, half hidden behind the tangle of her long dark hair. If her wool hadn’t been so good the villagers would have neglected her completely. They certainly didn’t expect her to become herself._

_Then one day in June, when the heat was so intense that it seemed to have flattened the world, and no one moved if they didn’t have to, young Taffy came running into town._

_“Adwr’s up on the mountain with Begw,” he said, his face puffed and red. Nan and Braith were shaken out of their apathy by his words, and in an hour the news was all over town. Two of the three were set, and there was only the last to come._

 

Dear Roger,

what great news about the prize! I’m so pleased for you, and I know Kelly must be chuffed too. I always felt you’d do well, and it’s nice to see that the world has finally started to agree with me. The money’s no bad thing either – have you decided what you’re going to do with it?

The summer has gone all out in the valley this year, the flowers are blooming like anything and there hasn’t been a sight of rain. And I know we’re supposed to have a microclimate, but even that doesn’t explain this kind of weather. The last time it was so good was when we were teenagers. When she came. The weather is always better in the years when she comes, or at least that’s what Gwyn says. Another sign, I suppose.

The three young ones are settling in more or less fine, but we’re keeping a close eye on them. Huw has been a bit awkward about Cecil – Cecil’s the English lad, and he’s studying folklore, so he and Gwyn are spending a lot of time together. Which has happened before, and it never bothered Huw, but now he’s almost resentful of it. It worries me. The story can’t invent tension out of nowhere, but it can pull and twist at what’s already there, and neither of us wants Huw getting hurt.

Huw and Annys, on the other hand, are hand and glove together at the moment. He’s been taking her all round the farms, introducing her to the local lads. Her summer project is all about sustainable farming. She’s tried to explain it to me, but every time she starts she ends up going off on a rant about the EEC and milk quotas and subsidies and somehow I’m not any clearer at the end than I was at the beginning. Huw is more tolerant though, and he seems happy enough tagging along with her. Not that this is necessarily a good thing. It’s pretty obvious that Cecil carries a torch for Annys, and the story will have its teeth into them quick enough if we’re not careful.

I can’t lay down the law, though. You remember how well that worked with us, which is to say not at all. Forbidding an eighteen year old something doesn’t stop it from happening. If anything it makes them more likely to do it, just to spite you. No, the only way this will be solved is with patience and conversation. You showed us that, in the end.

I don’t mean, by the way, to sound as if things are all doom and gloom. Far from it. We’re enjoying ourselves very much all things considered. Gwyn is in his element, playing the Gwydion for all it’s worth and having a great laugh of it. My latest book is coming on really well, and I’m hoping to have a second draft done by the time you’re here, so you can read it for me.

We try to have dinner with everyone in the evenings, and then play a round of cards or scrabble or something. I’m of the opinion that if the three of them have to sit around and be social it’ll help ease the tensions. Anything to make her come as flowers, not as owls. It’s mostly worked, though there was a minor hiccup on Saturday. Gwyn set up the record player, for a change, and we all sat in the billiards room with the windows open, watching the sunset. He put on one of the old jazz records – one of the first ones we bought with his scholarship money for the university – and I got a bit lost in it all, just dreaming away to the sound of Cannonball Adderley’s sax. I was sitting on the chaise-longue, kind of tucked up against Gwyn, who was reading. Cecil was sitting in the chair closest to the window, the old red moquette. Annys was in the old Victorian armchair, which we had re-upholstered five years ago. Huw was perched on the pouffe beside her, reading, and she was just watching the sky. It all seemed very innocent. Then I saw that her hand was resting very lightly in Huw’s hair, and though it was subtle I knew that Cecil could see it too, and he was boiling over with rage.

I don’t want you to think that all of this is merely my worry about Huw. Annys is a nice girl, and they’re both sensible enough. It wouldn’t do Huw any harm to have his heart broken by her, if it came down to that. But Blodeuwedd makes it all more complicated. I fear for owls again.

Well, as Gwyn says, what will be will be, and my fretting won’t make it any less likely. I didn’t mean to ramble so much about our problems, Roger. I am delighted for you and your prize, and I’m really looking forward to your visit.

Love,

Ali (and Gwyn)

 

_1873_

_William Beven was the local school master. He had been educated in England, and had come back to the valley to teach. The locals regarded him with a kind of patient wariness. He was one of them, at least by birth, but education had made him strange, and given him notions above his station. He insisted that the children of the valley should learn English._

_“What good will Welsh do them?” he said, furious and frustrated. “No one speaks Welsh but us, and if we don’t learn we’ll be forgotten. We don’t want to become like the Irish, scraping out a living in our hovels and cursing the government that gives us our bread. No, English is the only way forward.”_

_Callwen thought of him with unwavering distaste. Welsh was her language, and she was only grateful to be out of school long enough that she didn’t have to bow to his stupid ideas._

_And yet she couldn’t seem to be rid of him. He was always coming up to the house, talking to her about some nonsense or other. He knew that she had a reputation as a mistress of Welsh folklore, and there always seemed to be some point he wanted clarification on. Callwen gave him short, surly answers and wished him gone._

_She regretted that, later._

 

Dear Jen,

some very odd things have been happening. Even odder than usual, and I say that knowing what nonsense my last letters must have seemed.

It started on Monday. I woke up early – there was some kind of noise in the rafters, and once I opened my eyes I couldn’t get back to sleep. It was early morning, and the sun hadn’t even risen yet. The sky was full of pale, overlapping colours, and there was a heavy mist all down across the valley. I got up and went down through the fields. It was sweetly chilly, and the cold seemed to make the scent of the flowers very clear and sharp. My steps left a green trail through the pearly grass.

When I came near the river I heard a strange sound, a terrible groaning noise. I thought an animal was in pain or something, and I moved closer quietly, not wanting to scare it. But when I got near enough to see through the mist I realized I’d been wrong. It wasn’t an animal at all, but Cecil. He was sitting up against the stone, the Stone of Gronw, and he was sobbing and muttering to himself.

I felt so afraid. Isn’t that a terrible thing to say? But I did. There was this awful, hot feeling in my stomach. I knew I shouldn’t be hearing this, and yet I couldn’t make myself move away. I just stood there and listened.

What he was saying didn’t even make much sense. It sounded like mythology, and there was a lot of stuff about Llew and Bloddeuwedd in there that I didn’t follow at all. But some of the stuff he said was really familiar. He talked about that party – you remember Annie’s house party, back in March? – where we ended up sitting on the balcony and talking. I thought it was a fun night, but the way he talked about it made it seem like it was the most important night of his life. It made me uncomfortable.

Then he looked up. The sun was rising, and the mist was burning away, so fast it seemed like it was never there. He saw me right away. His face went all cold and white.

“This is all your fault,” he said. “You fucking bitch. It wasn’t enough for you, was it? You had to have it both ways. Always talking nice, always smiling and playing along, but your heart was never really in it. You never really cared. Do you even have a heart? Oh flowers are all very well, but what do they know of love? At least owls have some blood in them, some passion. What good are two thousand year old flowers? They’re nothing but dust.”

He wiped the tears away, all tense and angry, and shoved past me, off into the fields.

I didn’t go back for breakfast. I just sat by the river, feeling all flat and empty. I didn’t even want to cry. I just wanted it all not to be happening. It all seemed, oh, very dull and lifeless all of a sudden. All the colour in the valley seemed washed away. The flowers didn’t have any scent, and when I touched them they felt brittle and dry, like dead pressed roses.

Eventually Mr Updon came down and found me. I had been expecting Ali, but he stumped up in his old boots and looked down at me. He didn’t say anything, just looked at me and dropped a little tinfoil packet in my lap. It was full of sandwiches.

“Did Cecil tell you what happened?” I said, for lack of anything else to say. “I didn’t mean to overhear him.”

“He’d not say anything about it, are you daft, girl?” He wasn’t trying to be mean, but Mr Updon is pretty scary, with his big boots and his big gruff voice, and I think I cowered a bit.

“I feel really bad,” I said.

“Hmm.” He leant on the shovel he was carrying and looked at me for a long time. At last he said, very slowly, “what is it about you that drives this boy so mad, do you know?”

It sounds really judgmental when I write it down like that, but it wasn’t, not at all. It was a very slow, patient question, like he was trying to understand me.

“It’s complicated,” I said. “And I think most of it is Cecil’s story, really. I don’t know if I can tell you.”

Gwyn sighed and shifted.

“It’s always the way. Keeping it all bottled up inside. Thinking there’s no one who’s ever gone through this before.” He shook the hair out of his eyes. “Listen to me, girl. The story is coming back. Just like it did for us. You’re the centre – you and Cecil and Huw. If you don’t find the way out, it’ll be owls all over again. You mustn’t let that happen. You must know who you are.”

Then he wandered off and left me, with about a million questions burning inside my head. I couldn’t really do anything about that, though, so I just sat down and ate my sandwiches, and watched the river flow past.

All that would have been weird enough, but after dinner that evening Ali put a hand on my shoulder and asked me to come into the study. It had been a really awkward dinner, with Cecil not talking to me and me not talking to anyone.

“So Gwyn spoke to you earlier,” she said. “I got the feeling he wanted to talk to you about the story, but I think he was a bit, well, Welsh about it. He gets like that when he’s nervous. And besides I think there may be something to the story that makes him like that. We’re not supposed to interfere, you see.”

“I don’t really follow,” I said, which was the honest truth.

Alison looked at me very sharply.

“Would you stop pretending to be dim?” she said. “You know perfectly well what’s going on, you just don’t want to admit you do. You and Cecil and Huw are trapped in the story of Llew and Bloddeuwedd and Gronw, and if you’re not careful you’ll play it out to the bad ending instead of the good one.”

That floored me. I think my mouth was hanging down below my chest. Ali just rolled her eyes and waited for me to recover.

She told me an awful lot, all about what happened with her and Mr Updon and Roger (her step-brother. He’s coming here at the end of the summer, apparently). It was hard to swallow, but she never looked like she was joking. She just looked sad and serious and like she wished it wasn’t true.

I wanted to tell her everything then – all about the spring and Mike and Cecil, and even the thing about Cecil that I don’t like thinking about – but I couldn’t. That’s why I’m telling you. I know it sounds crazy, Jen, but I have to be brave enough to see this through. If I don’t then I think I’ll regret it for the rest of my life.

Since that night things have been a bit creepy. Ali and Mr Updon took down the heavy curtain in the billiards room, and there was a picture of a woman behind it, beautiful but kind of cold and cruel too. I didn’t like the look of her much. There’s something really noisy in the attic, but Ali won’t do anything about it. She just shrugs and sighs. Cecil has been lurking down by the river more and more, and Huw is all on edge too. He had a blazing row with Mr Updon yesterday. It was horrible to watch.

So that’s where I am. I don’t know what I’m going to do about this – or even what can be done – but whatever it is, I’ll do my best.

Love,

Annys.

 

_1648_

_The valley didn’t hear much of war, only what news the tinkers brought on their way through the town. But when the soldiers marched in they brought the war with them, full of stories about the King and Cromwell. They demanded quarter, and most of them ended up on Adwr’s land, pitching their tents down by the river among the thickets of meadowsweet and broom._

_That was where they found him. The  young Lieutenant Ivers, with his fair hair and his blue eyes like gentians, who picked flowers and set them in his buttonhole, and who talked to Begw about the sheep. But she was as cold with him as she was with Adwr – not the coldness of pride, but the slippery ice of disinterest. She had no longing for men, and she did not want their love. She was content to lie in the high pasture and dream with the sheep._

_They could not let her be. They hounded her, the two men, and while they chased her they snapped at each other. Bit by bit they came to harsher blows, and one evening when the drink was on him Adwr challenged Ivers to a duel. It was said in the heat of the moment, but Ivers was a man of pride, and he took it seriously. He was a soldier, young and foolish but a better warrior by far than Adwr would ever be, and his sword was sharp and keen. Adwr slid off the end of it like a man diving backwards into a deep pool._

_Then Ivers turned to Begw, and begged for her hand in marriage with the drunken glaze of confidence in his voice. Begw stared at him, horrified and astonished, before turning away towards the mountain. Ivers married Adwr’s sister and got the house and the lands of his enemy, but it gave him little good. He was hated in his lifetime, and his children and his grandchildren were outsiders in the village, though the power flowed through them clear as the stream by the house._

 

Dear Roger,

now I am beginning to get nervous. Things are going from bad to worse here. I thought it would be simple – with me and Gwyn here, and the fact that she was flowers last time, I thought we could manage it. But the three of them are at loggerheads, and Gwyn and I can’t figure out why.

I’ve often wondered if the valley creates tension, or if it just calls out what was already there. I could never tell, with the three of us. We seemed happy enough at the beginning, but maybe we would have collided no matter what?

Sorry Roger. I know I’m rambling. Let me lay the facts out for you, as clearly as I can, and maybe that will give me some clarity.

On Tuesday morning, about an hour after I’d started working, Huw came storming into the study, all huffy and glowering. He didn’t actually say anything, just sat slumped in a corner and glared. Which is son-speak for “please ask me what’s wrong because I don’t know how to talk about it.” I fished around a bit, asked careful questions, and eventually established that he and Annys had had a blazing row. He didn’t exactly say what it was about, but I got the impression that she was upset anyway, and had taken it out on him. That got my hackles up a bit, I must admit. Huw may be one of the three this year, but he’s still my son, and I don’t want him to suffer. I had to think very calmly to remember that Annys must have some pain of her own to be cruel to Huw, and that I shouldn’t judge her without knowing what it is.

I sent Huw off eventually, telling him to go down into the village and buy me some flour. I’m not even sure if we need any, but sometimes the old tricks are the best tricks. Then I went looking for Annys.

I found her in the kitchen garden, all curled up on the bench.

“That wasn’t nice, what you did to Huw,” I said. She shrugged, unhelpfully.

“He’s a nice boy. A bit headstrong, but he does care.”

“Caring is fine, but it doesn’t help me.” She looked up at me, and her eyes were all puffy and red.

“What would help you?” I said. She shrugged again.

“Nothing you can do.” She looked a bit sad. “Sorry. But the problem is I can’t tell you. It’s not something I can explain.”

And that was it. No matter what tack I tried, she wouldn’t give me a straighter answer than that. So I was left with Cecil, the third arm of our triangle.

I haven’t spoken much to Cecil, I admit it. He’s more Gwyn’s student than mine, and he’s a bit aloof, cold and standoffish. So rather than approach him myself I went to Gwyn about it. I told him what had happened, more or less, and he mulled it over for a few minutes.

“Annys and Cecil had a fight yesterday,” he said at last. “I saw them down by the river.”

I admit I lost it a bit right then. It was stupid and petty, but I felt incredibly frustrated that he hadn’t told me about the fight when he knew as well as I did that this was the Summer, and we had to make her come out flowers. We had a ridiculous argument and I almost walked out again, I was so furious. I would have, if he hadn’t stopped all of a sudden and pinched his nose, and then looked up at me from between his fingers. It was such a knowing expression, and it calmed me right down. We sorted ourselves out for a bit, and then went back to the three.

Not that Gwyn could clarify much, really. He told me that he knew Cecil had had some kind of accident around Christmas, and that he’d been in hospital afterwards for about a month. Which was fine, but didn’t seem to explain the way he was treating Annys.

We mulled it over for a while, but there was nothing much we could conclude, only that we needed to keep a closer eye on them.

On Friday Huw took the car and drove into Dolgellau, to pick up some things we needed for the farm. Usually Gwyn goes with him, but he had planned to take Cecil up the mountain, to try to get him to open up a bit. I was nervous, I must admit, but Huw has been driving for over a year now, and I thought he’d be fine.

They all set off about ten in the morning – Cecil and Gwyn up the mountain, and Huw down through the valley – and Annys and I had a very peaceful day to ourselves. She was a bit jittery, and said she hadn’t been sleeping well, but she relaxed as the morning went on, and by lunchtime she was chatting and making jokes again. I found myself thinking it was all going to be all right.

Gwyn and Cecil came back down at five o clock, more or less. I couldn’t ask Gwyn anything, not straight away, but he caught my eye and shook his head, and that was that. We began preparing for supper. I was expecting to hear the car any minute, but it never came.

We waited and waited, and there was no sign of Huw. I served the others at last, since the food was getting cold, but I couldn’t eat a bite myself. I just sat and fretted. At nine Gwyn and I headed down into the valley. The plan was to borrow a car from one of the men in the village and drive towards Dolgellau to look for Huw. I was terrified at this point, my hands shaking.

Then we heard the car on the road. It wasn’t the Volvo, and I remember that I grabbed Gwyn’s arm, wondering if it was going to be the police, and what I would do if it was. But it was old Harry Abbot, and Huw was sitting in the front seat beside him, holding a bag of frozen peas to his head. He’d hit a loose stone from a wall on his way into the valley, and the car had jolted off the road and into a ditch. Harry had picked him up while he was trying to restart it, and had driven him with the shopping up to the house. He had a nasty bruise from where his head had hit the steering wheel, but otherwise he was fine.

I have to admit, I couldn’t have written that last sentence at the time. I was still fretting and terrified, and I had to sit him down and check his head several times before I could accept that he was home, and safe, and not seriously hurt.

It was just as the shock was wearing off and Gwyn was preparing to give Huw a telling-off about driving carefully that Cecil came into the room. I was in the kitchen, making tea, so I didn’t actually see what happened, but I heard it clearly enough.

“You’re a damn sight luckier than you have any right to be, you know that?” Cecil said. His voice was hoarse and tense, and I felt my hands grip the cup more tightly. I remember thinking _Oh no_.

“What’s that supposed to mean? It was just a stone and a ditch, mate.”

“Exactly,” Cecil snapped. “What if had been another car? You shouldn’t have been allowed to drive alone.”

“What the fuck are you on about? I’m an adult.”

“Adults take responsibility. What if someone else had been in the car? You could have killed Annys.”

“It was one fucking stone. I never knew you were such a sissy.”

Gwyn stepped in then.

“That’s enough, both of you. Cecil, it’s my place to talk to Huw about this, not yours.”

“Talk to me? About what? The fact that none of this would have happened if you’d come with me instead of taking Mr English out for his daily romp? Have you forgotten who your son is?”

There was a moment of silence, and then Gwyn came stomping into the kitchen. He put his hands flat on the table, gripping the edge as hard as he could, and just breathed in and out, waiting to calm down. The kettle was singing on the gas ring, but I ignored it, going back through into the dining room.

Cecil had gone, but Annys was there, sitting next to Huw.

“It really wasn’t your fault,” she said. “It could have happened to anyone. You don’t need to feel bad.”

“Where does that fucker get off, telling me what to do? He thinks he’s a million years older than me, but he’s just a spoiled English brat.”

Annys ducked her head.

“Don’t be too hard on him, Huw. He’s got enough troubles of his own.”

“You’re defending him? Why are you always on his side? Slipping him one on the side, are you?”

Annys went white, and she stood up quickly.

“I think you should mind your own business, Huw. You don’t know me.” Her face was very high and haughty. You can guess what it reminded me of.

When she was gone I stepped out of the shadows.

“That wasn’t kind, Huw.”

“Wasn’t fucking meant to be. You’re always bollocking on about kindness, but where does kindness get me? I’m sick of playing the good little boy. I’m a man now, aren’t I? Time I started acting like one.”

“A man thinks before he acts, Huw. Remember Llew, remember Gronw. You know this story as well as your Dad and I do. Don’t let a moment of anger poison your life.”

“The story. Of course. It’s all about the bloody story. That’s the only thing you care about, isn’t it? Make her flowers, not owls. Make sure the valley is safe and comfortable. Do you even care about me? Or am I just another puppet to you?”

He stood up, all at once, and I was reminded how much he’s grown this year. He’s taller than me now. He walked out of the room, and I didn’t try to follow him. I didn’t know what to think. I was crying, and then I felt Gwyn come and put his arms around me.

“You know he’s wrong,” he said. “You care about the story because you care about him, Ali. If we let her be owls then he’ll end up all twisted with hate and rage, the way my father was. We can’t let that happen.”

But Roger, what can we do? I can’t see a way out of this maze. I haven’t spoken to any of them since last night. I’m just sitting in my study, fretting. I don’t know that you can help, but I’ll feel better if you understand what’s going on.

Love

Ali and Gwyn.

 

_1873_

_Daffy Sayer was the middle son of an old and traditional family. His elder brother was a stonemason, his younger brother a wheelwright. Daffy himself worked in the forge. He had big, sturdy hands and a handsome face. Callwen always called in on him when she went into the village, and he tipped his hat to her and called her Missus Ivers, even though they’d known each other since she was born. He was coldly scornful of William Beven, and he and Callwen often laughed together at stories she told him of William’s questions. Callwen had a clever, cruel way of imitating William that made Daffy laugh his deep, clear laugh, and every time he laughed she felt her heart clench._

_All summer the power built and built, and the air pressed down on the valley like the heat of a forge’s fire, until nothing grew and flourished but the flowers. Callwen walked the borders and watched the stone, but she did not see the end coming until it was upon her._

_There was a holiday from school, and William Beven walked by the forge when Callwen and Daffy were talking. Their loose laughing speech boiled in his heart and kindled a flame, and he stalked off up the valley, into the dark of the woods. When Callwen came home that night he was there, waiting for her, dark in his mind with anger and hate. He would have killed her, if Daffy hadn’t been there, and instead his brain was caved in with the blow of a shovel, and his blood soaked into Callwen’s skirt. It never came out. She had to burn the whole dress._

_Daffy killed her attacker, but he killed her love too. It spilled out over the stones in cold silence, and all that was left was the beating of wings._

_Callwen married a man from England, a peer like herself. Daffy took to the drink, and died in poverty. There was blood on the floor of the house, and there was bad blood in the valley. The Industrial Revolution was creeping across the land, and it was a bad time to be a simple farmer in a small valley._

 

Dear Jen,

when I wrote you my last letter I left out the dreams. They didn’t seem important at the time, just another part of the mess this summer has been. But I have to tell them to you now.

All summer I’ve been dreaming of darkness. I dream about the darkness under the roof of the house, in the tiny crawlspace of the attic. It’s dusty up there, and the wind comes through the gaps in the slates. In my dream I’m an animal. Something big and fluffy with huge eyes that see every movement in the dark, with long, sharp claws that rip and tear the flesh of animals, with heavy wings that beat the air and signal death to small animals. I am an owl.

Last night was the first night without dreams. I know why that is, but I want you to remember.

I thought things had gotten as bad as they could, when I sent you our last letter, but they only got worse. Huw was in a car accident, and that stirred up all of Cecil’s problems. and when I tried to calm things down Huw got angry with me. We were all at each other’s throats, and the air was just toxic and poisonous. That lasted about two days. I have to admit, when the Volvo came back up to the house I felt this awful sense of panic. You could see this big dent in the passenger door where it had gone into the ditch, and Cecil and Huw looked at it with these horrible hungry expressions. But I think Mr Updon must have noticed too, because he drove it into the shed and locked the door firmly, and then hid the keys away somewhere.

That was the day Ali got the phone call. I only heard her say a name – Roger – and then she kicked us all out of the house and made us go and sit in the garden. She was only the phone for about half an hour, and then she came outside and Mr Updon stood up and they went off and talked together. We had to make our own dinner, they took so long.

The next morning Ali woke us all up at seven o clock. She told us to get up right away and follow her, and the tone of voice she was using couldn’t be argued with. She led us down into the field by the river, where the stone is, and made us all sit down. Mr Updon was there, and there was another man too, tall and dark-haired and very English-looking. Ali introduced him as Mr Keswick, but I guessed he was the Roger on the phone. They built a kind of ring with small loose stones from the stream bed, and set out three chairs from the kitchen for us to sit on. Then they told us we couldn’t leave until we sorted things out.

There was a lot of shouting from Huw, and a lot of huffing from Cecil, but somehow none of us felt we could argue with them. I don’t know if there was any magic to the stones, of if it was just the magic of competent adults, but we all stayed.

After about half an hour Cecil tried to apologise. It was a pretty weak and wheedling apology though, the kind you make when you want to get out of a situation and you’d rather lose a little face than have a real conversation. Huw told him to fuck right off.

I was just sitting and watching them. I felt very, oh I don’t know, very cold and distant. As though I were high in the air and all this was happening below me. It was an unpleasant, proud kind of feeling. Somewhere in the back of mind I was still thinking of owls, and of the feeling of flying, and the movement of wings. The hairs on the back of my neck stood up, and when I looked around, Ali was staring hard at me. She asked me why I was being so quiet.

“I don’t have anything to say,” I told her.

“You don’t have any anger at all?” She was smiling at me, and speaking in this careful, syrupy kind of voice. “Nothing to say to these two brave boys who are fighting so hard for you?”

Looking back it’s obvious that she was goading me. Huw and Cecil’s fight wasn’t about me, not at all really, though they sometimes used me for an argument. But I didn’t think of that at the time. I just snapped back “no. And if they are fighting over me then it has nothing to do with me. I don’t love them, and they don’t love me.” Alison’s eyes narrowed, and she asked me how I knew that, still using the same syrupy voice.

“Huw likes me, but he doesn’t love me. He hardly knows me. And Cecil can’t love me.” Then I had to stop, because I’d promised Cecil I wouldn’t talk about that, and he was glaring at with boiling, vicious hatred.

Ali’s eyes flickered to Cecil, and she frowned.

“And not wanting either of them, not caring about them – is that enough to make you want her to come as owls?”

The word owl made me start.

“It’s always owls,” Ali said. “Owls or flowers. But the three of you have to choose. And what you choose will mark the valley. It will direct the power. And it will direct you, too.”

“I don’t want to hurt anyone,” I said. “I really don’t.” But my mind was full of the soft movement of owl wings, and the freedom of catching the wind.

Ali stared at me, and then, slowly and carefully, she began to speak.

“When I was her, over thirty years ago, now, it was owls that I saw first. But even later, when I knew she might be either, it was owls that called strongest. I was so afraid that summer. I had found something in Gwyn that seemed very important.” She stopped for a moment, and her hand pressed against her mouth. “And that was very scary. Because rich young women from landed English families did not marry poor Welsh boys. Mother threatened to take away tennis club and choir if I didn’t stop seeing Gwyn,” she lifted her eyes and smiled at him, “and I knew that was just the beginning. If I really wanted to be with him I would essentially be cutting myself off from my whole family. I couldn’t do it. So what made the difference for me, in the end, was Roger forgiving Gwyn, and telling me it would be all right. Then I could be flowers.”

Huw, sitting on the other side of the circle, squirmed uncomfortably.

“I don’t want her to be owls,” he said. “I know all the stories, Mam, I know it’d be bad for all of us. I just don’t want this to be about the story.”

Mr Updon sighed, and straightened up.

“We have done badly by you this summer, Huw,” he said. “We should have paid more attention. But you’ve borne it well, and we’re both proud of you. And when this is over we will have a talk about what needs to change.”

Huw seemed visibly to sag, and he shot me a kind glance.

“Sorry, Annie,” he said. “Been a bit rough with you lately.”

I smiled at him, but I felt no relief. I could feel Cecil’s gaze on me. Even as I thought that, he spoke.

“I don’t care,” Cecil said, and the words poured out of him as quickly as a hurricane. He had been pulling up the flowers in a circle all around him, and their dead heads lay tumbled at his feet. “I don’t care! I don’t care about this valley. Let her be owls. What does it matter what happens? At least owls are alive.”

The three of them, Ali, Mr Updon and Mr Keswick, shared a tense glance.

“What do you mean?” Mr Keswick said at last. “What do you mean by alive?”

“Flowers are dead,” Cecil said, and I could feel the pressure in him, boiling up and bubbling over. I wanted to be far away. I wanted this conversation not to be happening. My eyes opened wide onto a private darkness, and the bright morning sunlight seemed very dim and far away. “Flowers are just dead. They were only dead when they made her. If she’s owls she’s alive. Let her be owls then. What does it matter if she hates me? What does it matter if she loves someone else? Let her be owls and live.”

The silence seemed endless and heavy. The wind moved restlessly through the trees and the reeds by the river. The perfume of the grass and flowers lay thick and heavy on my mind. I knew that this was it, that the power of the valley had reached the dam of Cecil’s pain, and that however he spoke, it would make the choice.

He did not speak, he sobbed. It tore out of him, a long, undulating wail that stabbed right through me. I had heard it before, but that did not make it less sad. He told them all about Rachael, and how happy they had been. He explained the engagement, and their wedding plans. He explained about the fight, right before Christmas. He told them how he drove to her house to make up, and then they left to return to his parents for New Year’s. And then he told them about the car accident.

“I was trying to change the radio station,” he said. “I wasn’t concentrating. And then the other car came around the bend to quickly, and I couldn’t brake in time. I knocked my head against the steering wheel. When I opened my eyes she was dead. Her blood was all over my shirt, all over my hands. I was covered in it.”

He couldn’t continue. I moved over to him, and put a hand on his shoulder. He gripped it tightly, and I took that as my signal.

“We met in the Spring, after the accident,” I said. “I don’t really look anything like Rachael, at least in the pictures I’ve seen, but I don’t think that mattered. I was just there at the right time.” All of a sudden I found myself crying. I’d cried for Rachael and Cecil before, when I heard the story first and then again when he was feeling low, but never like this. The grief behind these tears was not mine. It was older and larger, the weeping of something huge and powerful that had known pain and loss.

“You have to let her go.” I spoke without realising that it was me, but I also wasn’t sure that it was. “She can’t stay. Let her die. Let her be flowers. Flowers grow, and bloom, and die. They are connected to the earth. They are at peace.”

As I spoke, something indefinable dwindled and died in me. Whatever the power was that had filled me for the last eight weeks, it faded and died away. All around us, the flowers were opening and the sun was spreading its warmth across the field. I looked up to see that everyone else was crying too, even Mr Updon.

“You did well,” she said. “You all did very well.”

We picked up the chairs, broke the circle of little stones, and went up to the house to have breakfast. And that was it. Even as we were eating it began to seem like a dream, and I can’t honestly tell you if any of it was true. Maybe the power was meaningless. Maybe it was just us. I don’t think I’ll ever know for sure, but whatever happened Cecil is feeling a lot better, and that can only be good.

We had both more or less finished our summer projects, so we took the last four days as a holiday, and the family joined us. Even Mr Keswick. We had picnics every day, and went swimming in the river and climbed the mountains. It was bliss. And then we got into the Volvo (rescued from the garage quite peacefully) and Mr Updon drove us off to the bus. I’m writing this from the station, and I’ll post it before I leave, but I’ll probably see you before you get it. I just wanted to write down so that I remember. It was real, it did happen.

Love,

Annys.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much to a_la_grecque for the wonderful prompt. I had an absolute blast writing this fic. There isn't enough Owl Service fic in the world, and so I hope my modest effort will make fans of the book happy.
> 
> The title of the fic is from a poem by Anne Sumigalski, a Canadian poet. Her poem Hanner Hwych, Hanner Hob was one of the few things I found online which referenced Huw and Nancy, so I decided to use a line from it. It's a strange and interesting poem, and I do recommend reading it.
> 
> I set the fic in the valley they filmed the series in, since it was apparently the inspiration for the novel.
> 
> If anyone has a question, please do ask in the comments and I will do my best to answer. Also feel free to point out any mistakes you notice (of grammar or fact).
> 
> Thank you for reading. <3


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